Library Automation and OPAC 2.0: Information Access and Services in the 2.0 Landscape

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Noting the increased importance of Web 2.0 in library services and the need to move beyond the classic model of library computerization, Tramullas and Garrido (information science and computers and systems engineering, U. of Zaragoza, Spain) assemble 10 articles by a group of scholars from Europe, South Africa, the US, and Singapore. The articles examine different aspects of the automation of libraries and OPACs 2.0 and the need to address the role, functions, and activities librarians should perform in the social digital library environment. Including chapters on tool applications, prototypes, interface analyses, proposals for analytic indicators, training environments, and XML, contributors discuss a new model for searching bibliographic information, a prototype for an OPAC that increases the user's interaction, the management of metadata tags in XML, integrating the Solr search engine into VuFind, the evolution of OPACs in Latin American countries towards 2.0 models, the possibilities of the semantic web, the difficulty of assessing the activity of users in Web 2.0, personal information management and Web 2.0, and education in the 2.0 environment.

These 10 chapters edited by a professor and assistant professor of information science and computers and systems engineering at the University of Zaragoza in Spain, bring library automation back into the forefront of discussion, especially as it concerns Web 2.0 and social networking. The work is international in scope and includes chapters on the topics of creating rich and dynamic library catalogs, XML in library cataloging workflows, intelligent personal agents in Library 2.0 environments, library analytics in the Web 2.0 era, and Web 2.0 technology as a teaching tool.